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For my creative portion of the project, I chose to conduct 8 in depth interviews.  Because my sample was taken from a college population, the sample was not entirely random, and cannot be used to make any generalizations about the public as a whole.  

The purpose of my interviews was to gauge opinions on declarations of war and involvement in war in general.  This is what my first round of interviews addressed.  The questions I asked were as follows:

  1.               In general, what are your opinions about our nation going to/being at war with another nation?  
  2.               As a citizen, to what degree do you feel that you are affected by our country being at war?
  3.               How do you feel about the current War on Terror in the Middle East?  
  4.               To what extent do you think the media influences what we know/think about the war?
  5.               Who do you think is to blame for being at war, the government, or the opposing side?

For my second round of interviews (with the same 8 people on a different day), I chose to tailor these questions to be George Bush specific.  The purpose of this was to see if the mentioning of George Bush altered their responses in any way.  George Bush received a rapid decline in approval and reputation during his second term and left many people with a bad taste in their mouth about the former president. I hope to see if his reputation influenced participants answers in any way.  The second round of questions are as follows:  

  1.                    What did you think about George Bush's declaration of war on terror?
  2.                   As someone who grew up under the Bush administration, how much do you think the war has affected you?
  3.                   How do you think the Bush   administration handled the War on Terror in the Middle East?
  4.                   To what extent do you think the Bush administration influenced the media and what we know/think about the war?
  5.                   Do you blame Al Qaeda or President Bush for the United States being at war?
The data I got after comparing the two sets of interviews was what I expected.  Almost 100% of responses to the questions mentioning George Bush were significantly more negative.  Instead of posting all of the recordings of the interviews, I have summarized the responses below.  In order to remain concise and because many of the responses I received were similar, I created a typical profile for the interview data based on the responses I received.  

The 8 people I interviewed almost unanimously wholeheartedly supported the United States being at war with another country if the war was justified.  They did not feel directly effected by the war unless they had a family member that served in the armed forces (3 participants).  They felt the War on Terror, again, was a good idea and were supportive of the initiative; however, they felt that it had gone on long enough and that it was now more about having a watchful presence over the Middle East rather than fighting terror.  They all 100% believed that media is influenced by the government and that we, in turn, are also influenced by selective reporting (four mentioned the controversy surrounding the reporting of Benghazi).  As for who is to blame, they agreed that the other side was to blame at first; however, since the war has gone on so long, it's hard to imagine that there isn't an ulterior motive or that it is not being driven by some government interest.  

For the second round, again, the responses were much more negative which I believe is due to the perception and reputation surrounding George Bush's presidency.  The responses to the first question nearly remained the same.  They supported the declaration of war due to the nature and circumstances at the time of declaration.  However, when asked how they felt it affected them, many cited the economic downturn as something that directly affected their families.  This they attributed to the large debt incurred by the war not only by the US, but globally as well.  Most believed that the Bush administration handle the war poorly and cited the invasion of Iraq in 2003 as one of the biggest downfalls and least strategic moves.  The participants did not feel that the administration itself influenced the media because many media outlets voice disapproval for the war and the presidency, especially towards the end of Bush's term.  They did however feel that the media does in fact influence what we think by selective reporting.  100% of respondents blamed Bush for us currently being at war.

While this experiment delved into people's political beliefs and ideologies, the answers spoke of the larger issue of party conflict.  The extremity of answers when Bush was mentioned pointed to the idea that many of my interviewees identified as Democrat, or at least more liberal than a typical Republican.